Tours: A Taste of Volunteering

If you’re anything like me, you’ve done a fair bit of travelling/working overseas in your time, but you’ve got to that point in your life when it’s not so easy anymore to drop everything and go on an extended jaunt. Grown-up life, with all those scary commitments such as mortgages and spouses, has caught up with me, and putting my career on hold, again, doesn’t feel like an option.

So that leaves me with a maximum of 2 weeks at any one time to fulfil my travel needs- to visit somewhere off the beaten track and really feel like I’ve experienced the culture from the inside. It’s a pretty tall order in such a short time frame.

One option which springs to mind is volunteering - it’s easy to find two week trips all over the world and what better way to really get under the skin of a new country? I’m not sure though. Call me selfish, but I don’t know if I really want to spend my holiday working. And I’ve never volunteered before so I don’t really know what to expect – do I want to risk my annual leave on something I’m not sure I’ll love? I also don’t want to stay in one place volunteering for two weeks, I only have a limited amount of time and I really want to see as much as possible!

Weighing all the options it seems like a volunteer tour is the best idea. But definitely not one of your usual tours where you drive through spectacular scenery in an air-conditioned coach, stopping-off on occasion to take photos and eat processed food from a manky buffet! I want something meaningful, where you experience a new culture full-on and maybe even have an opportunity to benefit the local area through your actions.

That’s where i-to-i meaningful tours come in. With one of these tours you can see all the amazing sights you’ve always wanted to see in your chosen destination, but you will also spend some time volunteering at a project. Not only will you be benefiting the local community, you will also have the opportunity to experience the country and get to know the people from the inside. What’s more, you can experience a taste of volunteering so that you’ll know if it’s something you want to do more of in the future. What more could you possibly ask for?!

More Volunteering Articles

<<The i-to-i Foundation and Volunteer Projects